Make your own fortune cookies
Fortune cookies are thing crisp sweet biscuits wrapped around a piece of paper with words of wisdom or future predictions written on them. They're usually served with dessert at chinese restaurants. Now you can make your own!
Fast fact
Most people think fortune cookies came from China, but the cookies appeared in California about 1920 to advertise a Chinese restaurant and soon they were everywhere!
What you’ll need
- Pencil
- Paper
- Scissors
- Lightweight cotton gloves
- Large mixing bowl
- Spoon
- Measuring cups
- Measuring spoons
- Cookie sheet
- Egg carton or muffin pan
- Spatula
- Ingredients
- 1/2 cup of melted butter
- 3 egg whites
- 3/4 cup of sugar
- 1/8 teaspoon of salt
- 1/4 teaspoon of vanilla extract
- 1 cup of flour
- 1 teaspoon of instant tea powder
- 2 tablespoons of water
How to do it...
1. Cut 48 strips of paper about 1.5cm wide and 8cm long. Write a fortune on each strip. Eg You'll make a new friend today, work hard and you shall be rewarded, smile and others will smile back at you, you'll be invited to a special party.
2. Melt the butter and separate the eggs.
3. Put the egg whites, sugar, and salt in a bowl. Mix them together.
4. Stir in the vanilla, flour, tea, water, and melted butter, one at a time. Chill this batter for at least 30 minutes. While it chills, heat the oven to 180C.
5. Grease the cookie sheet and drop a rounded teaspoon of chilled batter onto the cookie sheet. Spread the batter with the back of the spoon until it makes a thin circle 8cm across. Spread another circle of batter on the pan in the same way. Put only two cookies on the sheet. You won't have time to fold more than that
. Put the cookies into the oven and bake them 3-5 minutes, or until the edges turn brown.
Top tip: When using the oven or taking things out of it, make sure you ask and adult to help you.
Now it’s time to fold in your fortune...
1. Put on your cotton gloves. Using a spatula, slide one cookie off the cookie sheet and put the cookie on a clean counter top.
2. Lay a fortune across the center of the cookie. Lift one edge of the cookie and fold it so the cookie forms a semicircle. Work quickly!
3. Hold the cookie on the ends. Place the middle of the folded edge over the rim of the egg carton and bend the ends down.
4. Put the folded cookie carefully into one of the holes in the egg carton to cool. Then go back and fold the second cookie.
Top tip: It will probably take a lot of time doing two at a time, so the more people to help you fold, the more you can do at one time. 
Illustrations: Lisa Biganzoli